3 Paid Social Reports All Advertisers Should Have

What insights do you look for when reviewing Paid Social performance data? On native platforms, you may feel limited to conversion and engagement data. So how do you find out where you’re wasting money, or where you should be spending more money? What about performance data across initiatives? Without this information, you’re missing major opportunities to optimize and boost ROAS.

Here are 3 Paid Social reports you shouldn’t miss:

Report 1: Wasted Spend

In order to drive the best performance from paid social campaigns, we believe that one of the most important questions brands can ask is “Where is my spend underperforming?” Answering this question at a placement, campaign, or category-level requires technology that can quickly filter through large volumes of data in different views. At Rise we use our proprietary Connex® technology to help answer these questions, fast.

Below is a Wasted Spend report that identifies under-performing placements generating an insufficient ROAS. Our Wasted Spend report compiles campaigns that are spending a greater portion of the total budget (which we call Cost %) relative to the revenue they are driving (which we call Revenue %). We can then filter the table descending by spend to prioritize the highest impact optimizations.

Report 2: Scalable Opportunities

Once advertisers can sleep well at night knowing that they aren’t wasting spend on non-converting placements or tactics, we can tackle account growth and scale.

Our Scalable Opportunities Report identifies campaigns, placements, categories, etc. where the Revenue % is exceeding the Cost %. When that is the case, you could be investing more in those high-performing placements or campaigns. To get to this report, you can use the same columns as the Wasted Spend Report.

Looking at the data used below, notice the placements where Revenue % is exceeding Cost %. In these cases, you should consider pulling spend from placements where the inverse differential is occuring, and adding it to these high-performing placements. We can then prioritize optimizations to increase spend based on the campaigns or placements that are generating the most revenue.

Report 3: Reporting by Initiative (Or Category, Promotion, DMA, etc.)

Understanding spend and revenue performance within social platforms can be straightforward at an aggregate level. Things get a bit more difficult when trying to view performance based on specific promotional campaigns, or branding initiatives vs. eCommerce initiatives, and so on.

In the below example, our Initiative-Specific Report can help separate eCommerce from Branding performance, as well as isolate a specific Kids campaign. This view allows marketers to get a pulse on performance for the KPIs that are relevant for each initiative. In this case, it makes sense that our eCommerce ROAS is stronger than our Branding ROAS given eCommerce goals are typically tied to revenue performance. On the other hand, our Branding CPM is more efficient than our eCommerce CPM, which better accomplishes the goal of efficient reach and impression volume. This report requires disciplined naming conventions, an important step when launching campaigns.

This is a crucial report for making your insights work for your business goals. If you are running eCommerce initiatives alongside branding initiatives, there are many reasons why you need to look at performance data separately. Consider other dimensions where your stakeholders need a more granular view, and use this report to get there.

All of these reports (and even more customizations) are available in Connex, Rise’s proprietary analytics platform. Now supporting Facebook and Instagram, Connex streamlines your paid social process and helps you tailor every move to your unique business goals. To get these reports and start optimizing, contact Rise.